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Learning similar languages at the same time? yay or nay?

If someone wanted to learn two languages that were very similar, say Italian and Spanish, are you advised not to learn them simultaneously to prevent mixing-up? or is there no problem with learning these two languages at the same time?

Reply 1

Carpe Vinum

Well I sometimes get Spanish and German mixed up (like I'll be talking in German and randomly put in a Spanish word by accident) - and they're nothing like each other! So imagine the confusion if they are similar languages lol.

Having said that, it shouldn't stop you from learning them. Maybe do Italian one week, Spanish the next, to avoid too much confusion, or sth like that :smile:

Reply 2

tazarooni89

For GCSE I was learning French, Spanish and Latin at the same time.

They're probably not as similar as Spanish and Italian, but they still all belong to the same family of languages. Personally I found it more helpful than confusing. If I forgot how to say something in one language, I could think what it was in another language and it would give me a little reminder. Or if I saw a word I didn't recognise in one language, I'd be able to work out what it meant after knowing a similar word in another language, or understanding how the word might have been derived etc. Having lots of links and associations made things easier to remember for me.

Plus, even Italian, Portuguese etc. - I've never actively tried to learn them, but have often found that if I read something in either of those languages, I can still get the gist of what it's saying because of Spanish and Latin, which could have been useful if I ever did want to learn them.

There were times when I might have accidentally said something in Spanish when I should have said it in French, but I think if you just stop and think about what you say or write from beforehand, you can learn to separate the languages quite easily - the benefits still outweigh this.

(edited 10 years ago)

Reply 3

Катя

Original post by tazarooni89

For GCSE I was learning French, Spanish and Latin at the same time.

I always mixed up 'avec' and 'con' :tongue:

Bits of Latin grammar usually found their way into my French homework, too.

I actually really liked it. The more languages the better.

Reply 4

Emma G 15

I do French and Italian A Level, and occasionally have problems but I always get through them pretty quickly. My friend does Spanish, Italian and German, and she finds it hard sometimes but most of the time she's fine. I find it actually helps me a lot of the time, if I can't remember a French word the Italian is sometimes similar, and vice versa. I guess it depends on how skilled a linguist you are.

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